“We’ve seen significant advancements in device and social network adoption, placing a bulls-eye on the platforms and services users are embracing the most,” said Vincent Weafer, senior vice president of McAfee Labs. “These platforms and services have become very popular in a short amount of time, and we’re already seeing a significant increase in vulnerabilities, attacks and data loss.”

Additional warnings include those using URL shortening services. According to McAfee, more than 3,000 shortened URLs per minute are being generated for use in social media sites. Since a user doesn’t really ‘know’ what they are accessing when clicking on a shortened URL, McAfee Labs expects to see a growing number used for spam, scamming and other “malicious purposes”.

Apple was singled out for the popularity of its mobile devices. McAfee’s report states, “The popularity of iPads and iPhones in business environments, combined with the lack of user understanding of proper security for these devices, will increase the risk for data and identity exposure, and will make Apple botnets and Trojans a common occurrence. “

Geolocation services, Internet TV applications, “personalized” malware and ‘hacktivism’, a la the WikiLeaks variety, are also mentioned in the report.